All vikisWorld of Warcraft
We rate World of Warcraft S tier, 8.5 out of 10: 10/10 in PvE but only 6/10 in fair pricing, because one subscription now opens three live games and the biggest launch in WoW's history, while modern WoW still sells an expansion, gold tokens and level boosts on top.
We rate World of Warcraft S tier (8.5 out of 10). WoW earns 10/10 in PvE but only 6/10 in fair pricing. Our sharpest view: in Nov 2026 the reason to subscribe is World of Warcraft: Forever, not the modern game. Blizzard said Forever, out Nov 4, 2026, was WoW's biggest launch by peak concurrent players, without giving a figure (Game Developer, Nov 9, 2026). In the same week, hourly Mythic+ runs in modern WoW were down 40.94% in the US and 45.05% in Europe (Icy Veins from Raider.IO data, Nov 8, 2026). TheLazyPeon put WoW Classic in A tier in his MMORPG Tier List 2026 and called retail "positive overall". We go one tier above his Classic, because he published that list on Dec 11, 2025, before Forever existed.
We think Blizzard announces no Warlords of Draenor Classic through March 2027. Mists of Pandaria Classic reached its last phase on Jun 2, 2026, BlizzCon 2026 said nothing about what follows it (Blizzard Watch, Sep 16, 2026), and Forever now gives old WoW a permanent home.
Confidence: Likely. Check by: Mar 2027.
Three games are live on one subscription. Forever launched on Nov 4, 2026 with more than 1,000 new quests and nine new dungeons at a level cap of 60 that never rises; its newest hotfixes are dated Nov 10, and its first three raids open Dec 9. Modern WoW runs the Midnight expansion (out Mar 2, 2026) on patch 12.1.5, in Season 2 since Aug 18. Classic covers Mists of Pandaria Classic, The Burning Crusade Classic, Classic Era, Hardcore and Season of Discovery, all patched in that Nov 6 hotfix post. The subscription is $14.99 a month in the US, played through the Battle.net app. WoW is a tab-target theme park MMO built on quests, dungeons, raids and battlegrounds. In TheLazyPeon's Nov 10, 2026 video, Forever was "the smoothest day one MMO launch I've ever experienced".
Scores
| Category | Score | Why in one line |
|---|---|---|
| PvP | 8/10 | Every instanced size from arena to 40 against 40, but no sieges or territory |
| PvE | 10/10 | Raids for 10, 20 and 40 players, Mythic+, Delves and nine new leveling dungeons at once |
| Solo play | 9/10 | Forever's 1 to 60 journey plus Delves that gear a solo player like a raider |
| Combat | 8/10 | The most responsive tab targeting around, in two speeds, never action combat |
| Fair pricing | 6/10 | One fee for three games, then a $49.99 expansion, a $20 gold token and $60 boosts |
| Population | 10/10 | Our judgment: Blizzard calls Forever its biggest launch and publishes no number |
| Overall | 8.5/10, S tier | The mean of the six: 51 divided by 6 |
Pros and cons
Pros
- One $14.99 subscription opens Forever to level 60, modern WoW to level 80 and every Classic version, the shop's own list says.
- Forever "sticks to a level cap of 60 without going beyond", in Blizzard's words, so no expansion wipes your gear.
- Forever's raids come in three sizes on Dec 9: 10, 20 and 40 players.
- Delves let a solo player earn gear at the level of heroic raiders, IGN's reviewer found.
- Legacy points in Forever reward alts, professions and reputation across the whole account.
Cons
- Modern WoW charges on top of the fee: Midnight from $49.99, and each new expansion again.
- Blizzard sells gold in modern WoW through the $20 WoW Token, and level 80 boosts at $60.
- Forever's new Skyborne race sits in a $29.99 pack.
- Seven live versions confuse newcomers: the Nov 6 hotfix post covers six, and Forever is the seventh.
- Modern WoW's season treadmill is losing players to Forever: Mythic+ runs fell about 41% in the US in launch week.
- Forever's endgame is unproven: no raid is open before Dec 9, and Hardcore has no date.
PvP: 8/10
We think no rival offers this many instanced formats. Modern WoW has arenas, rated seasons, Slayer's Rise, a 40 against 40 epic battleground, and Training Grounds against bots for beginners. Forever adds Darkspear Islands, 15 against 15 with a race to 2,000 points, and a 14-rank ladder with a weekly cap that ends in epic weapons. In TheLazyPeon's 2024 The War Within video, battlegrounds were the part he kept playing: "I always have fun in WoW BGs".
What holds it below 9: WoW has no sieges, no territory control and no guild warfare, and its world PvP is optional. Fairness is also work in progress: Blizzard's Nov 10, 2026 faction update said the worst region sat at roughly 55 to 45 and made the bigger side harder to join. An arena in Forever would raise this score; a widening faction split would lower it.
PvE: 10/10
Modern WoW's current raid, The Venomous Abyss, has eight bosses on Normal, Heroic and Mythic, beside Mythic+ dungeons and Delves up to tier 11. IGN's Midnight video review shows Den of Nalorak, where the party races predators for food, and says of boss design after addons lost much of their function: "we're better off for it so far".
Forever stacks a second PvE game on top. Blizzard's raid overview lists Barrow Deeps (10 players, eight bosses), Hyjal Summit (20 players, 13 bosses) and Onyxia's Lair (40 players) for Dec 9, and TheLazyPeon's launch video reports a new or old dungeon every two levels from level 16. We give the 10 on volume and range, more than any rival we cover. It drops to 9 if the next tier's gear makes these raids worthless, the one thing Forever promises not to do.
Solo play: 9/10
Two different solo games exist here. In modern WoW it is Delves: IGN's reviewer calls them "actually challenging solo content" that gears a lone player "at the same level as the people who are doing heroic raids". In Forever it is the road to 60: in his Nov 10 video TheLazyPeon was level 26, with a quest log doubled to 40, five professions kept current and a bank full of herbs to sell.
The creators disagree about Delves. TheLazyPeon's 2024 video found them so dull after seven runs that he would "rather never do them again", and called The War Within's leveling "a bit of a slog". We side with IGN for 2026, since its review found Delves improved in Midnight, but his complaint about modern leveling stands: Midnight ships with a level 80 boost, and we think that says the old levels are there to be skipped. That, and Forever leaning on group dungeons every two levels, keeps this from a 10.
Combat: 8/10
TheLazyPeon's tier list says retail has "some of the best tab targeting in the MMO genre" and that it "feels super responsive to play". We agree. Forever is the slow version on purpose: Bellular calls it "way slower" than the modern game.
It stops at 8 for two reasons. It is tab targeting, so players who want action combat will bounce off. And Forever's balance is still moving: the Nov 10 hotfixes reworked Enhancement Shaman, cut Affliction Warlock's Wrack by 30% and reset Hunter pet health from 150% to 115% of normal, six days after launch.
Fair pricing: 6/10
$14.99 a month ($12.99 on the 6 and 12 month plans) covers every version, and Forever needs nothing else. TheLazyPeon says in his launch video that Forever has "no WoW token", so its gold is earned in play.
Modern WoW is where the score falls. Midnight costs $49.99 for the Base Edition and up to $89.99. The WoW Token costs $20.00 and turns into gold on the auction house, and a level 80 boost is $60.00. Forever's Skyborne race needs the $29.99 Heroic Pack. All shop prices were read on Nov 12, 2026. Under our pricing scale this counts as selling power, though slowly and indirectly: we think gold buys crafted gear and carries, not a guaranteed best item. Forever alone would score 8.
Population: 10/10
This score is our judgment, because Blizzard publishes no concurrent or subscriber figure, only the claim of its biggest launch. In his Nov 10, 2026 video, Bellular reports Raider.IO counting a little over two million Forever characters above level 10, and a post from WoW's account in China of one million concurrent players there; we could not open that post ourselves. WoW once reported 12 million subscribers (Oct 2010, as Bellular recounts), so we judge its biggest launch ever to be far past our 100,000 line. The trend is up for Forever and down for modern WoW. Nobody outside Blizzard can see how many players are new and how many simply moved.
What creators say
TheLazyPeon (Nov 10, 2026) says he is a WoW player again "for the first time in about nine years", and that classic WoW is "objectively an S tier MMO when it comes to the feeling of the journey". A month earlier he warned that the "biggest unknown" is how horizontal level 60 turns out. We agree on both, and our PvE 10 carries that risk.
Bellular (Nov 10, 2026) goes further: he calls retail "basically cooked in the short term" and expects Midnight's Eclipse patch, due early 2027, to be eclipsed by Forever. We half agree: the Mythic+ numbers back him, but both games bill the same subscription, so Blizzard loses nothing when a player switches.
IGN's Leana Hafer (2026) scored Midnight 9 out of 10 and called this "a second golden age of WoW". TheLazyPeon's tier list said the opposite of retail: "the game's only as big as the latest content update". We think both are right, and that Forever is Blizzard's answer to his complaint.
Who should play it, and who should not
WoW suits anyone who quit because every expansion erased their gear, anyone who wants endgame alone on their own clock, and anyone after organized raiding at any group size. Our World of Warcraft: Forever viki has the classes, leveling routes, dungeons and every hotfix.
Look elsewhere when a monthly fee is a dealbreaker, or when only action combat will do. TheLazyPeon made Old School RuneScape his main MMO for the permanence Forever now copies, so that is the nearest alternative for that itch. For a story-first MMO he still says he would "rather play WoW over" Final Fantasy XIV, though he was positive on it. We think players who put open-world PvP first should look at Aion 2 instead.
Sources
- World of Warcraft: Forever Now Live!, Blizzard Entertainment, Nov 4, 2026, read Nov 12, 2026
- WoW: Forever Hotfixes - November 10, 2026, Blizzard Entertainment, read Nov 12, 2026
- Hotfixes: November 6, 2026, Blizzard Entertainment, read Nov 12, 2026
- World of Warcraft: Forever Raid Overview, Blizzard Entertainment, read Nov 12, 2026
- How PvP Progression in World of Warcraft: Forever Works and Battle for the Darkspear Islands, Blizzard Entertainment, Oct 7, 2026
- WoW: Forever, What's New and What Feels Familiar, Blizzard Entertainment, Nov 3, 2026
- Take Up Arms with Midnight's PvP Updates, Blizzard Entertainment
- PvP Faction Balance Updates, Blizzard Entertainment (Kaivax), World of Warcraft forums, Nov 10, 2026
- World of Warcraft Subscription, World of Warcraft: Midnight, World of Warcraft: Forever, WoW Token and Enhanced Level 80 Character Boost, Battle.net Shop (US), read Nov 12, 2026
- World of Warcraft: Forever is the MMORPG's biggest launch as measured by peak concurrent players, Game Developer, Nov 9, 2026
- WoW Players Are Leaving Mythic+ for WoW Forever, and the Numbers Show It, Icy Veins, Nov 8, 2026
- Everything you need to know about WoW Midnight Season 2, Jul 28, 2026, Patch 12.2 Eclipse, Sep 12, 2026, and the future of WoW Classic progression servers, Sep 16, 2026, Blizzard Watch
- World of Warcraft: Midnight, OpenCritic, read Nov 12, 2026
- WoW Forever Launch Was INSANE!, TheLazyPeon, Nov 10, 2026 (video)
- WoW Forever Might SAVE MMOs...But, TheLazyPeon, Oct 9, 2026 (video)
- MMORPG Tier List 2026 - Over 100 MMOs, TheLazyPeon, Dec 11, 2025 (video)
- WoW: The War Within First Impressions, TheLazyPeon, 2024 (video)
- World of Warcraft: Midnight Video Review, IGN, 2026 (video)
- WoW Forever Is F-king Huge, Bellular Warcraft, Nov 10, 2026 (video)
Moments
WoW Forever Launch Was INSANE!
TheLazyPeon
- Three games are live on one subscription. Forever launched on Nov 4, 2026 with more than 1,000 new quests and nine new…
- $14.99 a month ($12.99 on the 6 and 12 month plans) covers every version, and Forever needs nothing else. TheLazyPeon…
- TheLazyPeon (Nov 10, 2026) says he is a WoW player again "for the first time in about nine years", and that classic…
WoW: The War Within First Impressions "Is It Worth Playing?"
TheLazyPeon
World of Warcraft: Midnight Video Review
IGN
MMORPG Tier List 2026 - Over 100 MMOs
TheLazyPeon
WoW Forever Is F-king Huge
Bellular Warcraft
Related
-
Eve OnlineWe rate Eve Online C tier, 6.0 out of 10: 9/10 in PvP but only 4/10 in combat and 3/10 in fair pricing, because the largest player wars in any MMO are fought by clicking menus, in a store that sells skill points and tradable PLEX for cash.
-
Guild Wars 2We rate Guild Wars 2 A tier, 8.0 out of 10. It is 9/10 in solo play and 9/10 in combat but only 7/10 in fair pricing and 7/10 in population, because a level cap that has never moved makes it the easiest MMORPG to return to, while six expansions and a gem shop full of storage upgrades make it less cheap than "no subscription" sounds.
-
Lost ArkWe rate Lost Ark C tier, 6.3 out of 10: 10/10 in Combat but only 2/10 in PvP and 3/10 in Fair pricing, because the best top-down fighting in the genre sits in a game that removed its arena in Feb 2026, sells gold, and lost half its Steam peak during the year.
-
New WorldWe rate New World D tier, 5.0 out of 10: 8/10 for solo play but 1/10 for population, because Amazon closes every server on Jan 31, 2027, the game left sale on Jan 15, 2026 and Steam's October 2026 peak was 659 players. Owners still have a fine solo adventure to finish; nobody else can get in.
-
RuneScapeWe rate RuneScape (the modern game players call RuneScape 3) C tier, 6.0 out of 10. It is 9/10 for solo play but only 2/10 in PvP, because its quests and skills are among the best in the genre while its Wilderness is opt-in and empty. Jagex removed Treasure Hunter in January 2026 and announced a fourth RuneScape MMO in October 2026 that will not replace it.
-
Throne and LibertyWe rate Throne and Liberty C tier, 5.5 out of 10. It is 7/10 in PvE but only 4/10 in fair pricing, and the guild PvP it was built for is down to 6/10 because too few people are left to fill it. Its best Steam month of 2026 peaked at 12,984 players, and NC took the game back from Amazon on Nov 10, 2026.
-
Where Winds MeetWe rate Where Winds Meet A tier, 8.2 out of 10: 9/10 in solo play and combat but only 6/10 in PvP, because it is a single-player Wuxia RPG first and an MMO second. It is free, sells almost nothing but looks, and peaked at 98,239 players on Steam in 2026.
-
MMORPG RankingsWorld of Warcraft is our number 1 MMORPG, the only S tier, at 8.5 out of 10 a week after Forever launched. We score 14 MMORPGs out of 10 for PvP, PvE, solo play, combat, fair pricing and population by one rule, and say why each score is what it is.
See also
-
Old School RuneScapeWe rate Old School RuneScape A tier, 7.7 out of 10. It is 10/10 for solo play and 10/10 for population but only 5/10 for combat, because the best long game in the genre is still played by clicking and waiting on a 2007 engine, and its membership has risen 20% since 2022.
-
Final Fantasy XIVWe rate Final Fantasy XIV A tier, 7.5 out of 10. It is 9/10 in PvE and solo play but only 4/10 in PvP, because its raids and its free story are the best in the genre while PvP is a side mode the free trial does not even include.
-
Aion 2We rate Aion 2 B tier, 6.8 out of 10: 10/10 in population and 8/10 in solo play but only 3/10 in fair pricing, because the busiest MMORPG of 2026 puts its player market behind a US$14.99 monthly Membership and lets bought Quna turn into the Kina that gear runs on.
-
ArcheAge ChroniclesWe rate ArcheAge Chronicles B tier, 7.0 out of 10, in Early Access: 10/10 in fair pricing but only 4/10 in PvP, because a $29.99 game with no shop carries the name of a PvP sandbox and ships with no arena, no sieges and no reward for a kill. Its Steam launch peaked at 26,244 players at once.
-
Ashes of CreationWe rate Ashes of Creation D tier, 1.0 out of 10. Every score is 1/10 because nobody can play it today. Intrepid Studios laid off its whole staff on Jan 31, 2026, Steam stopped selling the game two days later, and the official servers and website are gone. The last playable build was a 7/10 for combat and a 4/10 for group content.
-
Black Desert OnlineWe rate Black Desert Online A tier, 7.5 out of 10, by the narrowest margin. It is 10/10 in combat but only 4/10 in fair pricing, because the best action combat in the genre sits on top of a cash shop that still sells enhancement help and experience boosts.